Tenant attorneys, advocates and policymakers say the delays that Nichols has encountered demonstrate the flaws of the city’s code enforcement program, and the limits of a housing court system that can move at a glacial pace when it comes to holding owners accountable for unsafe conditions.
Housing and Development
Dilapidated Apartments, Lousy Landlords Plague NYC’s Sprawling ‘Scattered-Site’ Supportive Housing Network
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There are some 16,000 scattered-site supportive housing units across the city, rented and overseen by nonprofits contracted to provide services to tenants. But outdated contracts that trail actual market rents mean the organizations—and the state and city agencies that fund them—are propping up some of the city’s worst housing.
Housing and Development
Carrión Takes Helm at NYC Housing Agency After Stint as ‘Worst Evictor’ Consultant
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New York City’s new housing commissioner is returning to public office after a years-long stint working with a quick-to-evict Bronx developer recently subject to a state investigation, raising concerns among tenants and advocates in the borough.
CIty Limits Investigative Internship Program
Plastic Bags Still Ubiquitous in NYC Shops, Months After Enforcement of Ban Began
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The effectiveness of New York’s plastic bag ban could serve as a portend for other, similar bans on single-use plastics either already approved or under discussion at both the city and state legislative levels. To get a better sense of how its implementation is going, City Limits’ CLARIFY interns spoke to more than 50 bodega owners and store workers in the outer boroughs to see if they’re still using plastic, and if so, to tell us why.
Housing and Development
What Ever Happened to CBAs? The Rise and Fall of ‘Community Benefits Agreements’ in NYC
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Once a seemingly promising structure to ensure that real estate groups don’t run roughshod over local neighborhoods in development deals—and still a common practice in other cities—CBAs are now disdained by many New York City community groups and developers alike. The mechanism’s demise is a lesson, development experts say, in both the strength and limitations of demanding concessions in exchange for neighborhood-changing construction projects.
Zoned Out: Examining the Impact of NYC's Rezonings
House Flippers Continue to Target East New York. Residents Blame the 2016 Rezoning
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Home prices in the predominantly Black and Latino neighborhood began to tick up before then-Mayor Bill de Blasio announced plans to rezone 190 blocks in 2014. But affordable housing advocates and local residents say the rezoning, approved in 2016, only drove more speculators to scoop up homes, jack up prices and push out existing residents.
Health and Environment
Company Settles With Home Health Aides Seeking Unpaid Wages For Round-the-Clock Care
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State guidelines and federal regulations mandate that home health aides working 24 hours at a client’s home get eight hours for sleep and three hours of meal breaks, all unpaid. But many workers say the rule routinely leads to underpayment because their patients actually need constant care, leaving the aides little time to sleep or take breaks.
City on the Edge: Climate Change and New York
Two Months After Ida, Only 32 Undocumented New Yorkers Have Received Storm Damage Relief Funds
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So far, 85 undocumented applicants have been approved to receive the city and state joint relief assistance funds; another 33,000 survivors have been approved for FEMA’s Individual Assistance Program as of Nov. 21. Both relief programs are set to close on Dec. 6.
Zoned Out: Examining the Impact of NYC's Rezonings
3 Years After Bronx Rezoning, Jerome Avenue Auto Shops Under Pressure
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As part of the 2018 Jerome Avenue rezoning deal, city officials committed $1.5 million in financial assistance for area merchants, intended to help relocate existing businesses that would be displaced. But officials have yet to issue any such grants, a City Limits investigation found.
A Family Affair: Parents, Children and NYC's Homelessness Crisis
‘They Were Uninhabitable’—Ex-Landlords Leave Raft of Hazards at Former Bronx Cluster Sites
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In June, the city spent $122 million to purchase 14 former cluster site buildings, turning them over to nonprofit organizations to fix up and operate as permanent housing. The organizations have their work cut out for them: There were more than 1,100 open Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) violations across the portfolio at the time of purchase.
City on the Edge: Climate Change and New York
As Conditions at Rikers Reach Crisis Levels, Concerns About Heat Persist
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Dozens of men splitting a single jug of water, sweating walls in cell units, inmates sucking air from cracks under doors—these are just some of the conditions inmates and advocates have reported from Rikers Island over the past few months.